This week in Tampa: Sublime With Rome, C+C Music Factory, Summer Jam 8 and more

After a week like this one, we could all use a three-day weekend. Thankfully it's almost Labor Day, and one of the most brah-tastic tours of the year is coming to Tampa Bay: Sublime With Rome (above), Matisyahu, the Dirty Heads and Pepper, all in Pinellas Park.

Other artists coming to town this week include Otep, C+C Music Factory, Vanilla Ice, Kid 'n Play, Rob Base, DJ Skribble and the annual Summer Jam, featuring David Dondero. Here to walk you through it all is Carole Liparoto...

Sublime with Rome With Cypress Hill, Matisyahu, Dirty Heads, PepperSATURDAY 2:30 p.m. England Brothers Bandshell Park, 5010 81st Ave. N, Pinellas Park. $27 and up. (727) 541-0700. Singer Rome Ramirez was only 10 years old when he fell in love with Bradley Nowell and the Sublime boys from Long Beach, Calif. Today the 20-something is fronting the band he once idolized, firing on all cylinders on new originals like Panic. Also performing are sun-loving pacifists The Dirty Heads, who broke out with Lay Me Down, a reggae-rock-hip-hop love story heavy on yearning and Corona. Hasidic hip-hop and reggae star Matisyahu, who’s featured on the Dirty Heads latest Cabin by the Sea — a disc you turn to when you need “a breather in life,” says guitarist Dustin “Duddy B” Bushnell — will also perform. High Times poster band and Insane in the Brain bringers Cypress Hill and positive vibe merchants Pepper round out the bill.

Summer Jam 8 Featuring Five Eight, David Dondero, The Applebutter Express, Easter Island, The Owsley Brothers, The Woolly Bushmen, The Rosewoods, Chasing Kings, Bluebird, Jensen Serf Co, Moon Lasso, Mouse Fire, Rec Center, Outmode, Not a PlanetSATURDAY 5 p.m. New World Brewery, 1313 E Eighth Ave., Ybor City. $13-$16. (813) 248-4969. We can’t think of a more fitting anthem for Summer Jam, the reliably warm, offbeat Tampa fest now in its eighth season, than David Dondero’s tune South of the South. On the track, the folk troubadour sings, “I was just a tender chicken in the Florida rotisserie, my own sweat’s basting me, thunderstorms are chasing me.” Recognized as one of the “best living songwriters” by NPR’s All Song Considered, Dondero will head up the event alongside Five Eight, a beloved alt-rock act out of Athens, Ga. reminiscent of R.E.M. A dozen or so other sweaty, feisty locals fill out the bill, including throwback trio The Woolly Bushmen, who mix rockabilly with British mod-rock for a feral, danceable sound (like Buddy Holly fronting the Troggs), and Jensen Serf Co., young punks with anarchic energy and affinity for waves (like Bleach-era Nirvana covering Best Coast from inside a cave). It’s the perfect event to curb your indie/alternative cravings until next year’s Tropical Heatwave or Antiwarpt.

Otep With Butcher Babies, One-Eyed DollTHURSDAY 7 p.m. State Theatre, 687 Central Ave., St. Petersburg. $15. (727) 895-3045. Los Angeles metal act Otep has experienced turnover more familiar to waitstaff or cold-call reps than rock bands. Lucky for us, the constant in the band is female firecracker Otep Shamaya, whose Exene Cervenka-channeling lungs lead the group in its 12th year. The politically charged singer, songwriter and renegade Shamaya describes the band’s music as “complete mutiny on the senses.” And she’s not kidding. On fifth malevolent creation Atavist, Shamaya’s demonic roar powers the band’s heaviest, most primal metal yet. Shamaya has spoken at the Democratic National Convention (2008) and has appeared on on HBO’s Def Poetry and TLC’s L.A. Ink. Before the show, at 4:30 p.m., Otep will hold a poetry reading and signing at Daddy Kool Records across the street from the State.

Old Skool Weekend With Kid ’n Play and C&C Music Factory (Saturday); Vanilla Ice, Rob Base and DJ Skribble (Sunday) SATURDAY-SUNDAY Shephard’s Beach Resort, 619 S Gulfview Blvd., Clearwater. Free-$20 throughout the weekend. Call (727) 441-6875 for set times. Picture if you will, Chris Farley living in a van down by the river, an upstart called the “Internet” gaining momentum, and a guy named the Rocketeer schooling us on chewing gum and jet packs. These moments from the early ’90s did indeed happen, and you can relive some of the magic this weekend when the era’s hit music makers take to the oceanside stage for an “Old Skool” weekend. Kid n Play and C&C Music Factory will bring back George H.W./Clinton-era memories with a performance on Saturday. Rob Base and Vanilla Ice, who’s become as familiar at Shephard’s as sunburned tourists, play Sunday.